Bacon pancakes sound like a sinful breakfast treat, but these slightly sweet, mostly savory cakes require no repentance. Fluffy, moist, and salty with just a hint of sweetness, bacon pancakes can be served with a light drizzle of maple syrup, or a dollop of sour cream and a hit of hot sauce.
Primal and paleo pancakes are a far cry from diner-style pancakes made from all-purpose flour and browned in butter on a hot griddle. But, our bacon pancakes provide a grain-free salty, smoky breakfast treat with a chewy, sturdy texture. These aren’t bacon slices cocooned by airy, fluffy pancakes that get drowned in syrup the minute they hit the serving plate, rendering the once-crisp centerpiece soggy and flabby when it touches the tongue.
We fry our bacon pancakes in the rendered bacon grease to drive home the point that bacon remains the star of this show. Drizzle on a touch of raw honey or pure maple syrup if you desire a salty-sweet pairing. We prefer a dollop of full-fat sour cream and a spattering of freshly snipped chives for a tender, subtle springtime flavor as an accent.
Why Add Gelatin to Primal/Paleo Pancakes?
Peruse the list of ingredients for these Primal pancakes and you’ll see the usual suspects (coconut flour, eggs, butter) mixed with bacon and chives. But this recipe also has something completely new: gelatin.
Why add gelatin to pancakes? Gelatin provides structure and binds the other ingredients together in a pliable way that adds a chewy, moist texture to the pancakes. Anecdotally, gelatin can benefit bone, joint, and skin health and improve sleep quality.
If you’ve ever made paleo or Primal pancakes with almond or coconut flour, an egg, and maybe a little whey protein powder or collagen peptides, you probably ended up with dry, crumbly pancakes. If you don’t drown your plate in maple syrup or whipped cream, your grain-free pancakes can disintegrate into rubbery and parched nut meal.
This recipe shows how easy it is to work unflavored gelatin into your diet. Add granular gelatin to other types of Primal pancakes and baked goods, soups and stews, meatloaf, smoothies, whatever. (Ideally, dissolve the gelatin in a little water or other liquid when adding it to a recipe).
What Goes Into Making Bacon Pancakes?
To make our grain-free, Primal, and paleo bacon pancakes, we use two “secret” ingredients: gelatin (we already told you that one) and egg whites. We whip egg whites to add fluffy, cloud-like airiness to what might otherwise be supremely dense pancakes thanks to nut flour, bacon crumbles, and rendered bacon fat.
Here are our best tips for making bacon pancakes:
Use a tablespoon of purified granular gelatin (we used a single-ingredient product made from beef gelatin) to make six small bacon pancakes. Dissolve the gelatin in ½ cup of room temperature water.
Use an electric mixer to whip the egg whites to stiff peaks. The batter will be lumpy when you fold the crisped bacon bits with the coconut flour, gelatin, and whipped egg whites. Don’t fret. That’s right.
Cook the bacon in the skillet first to crisp it and render the fat. Fry the bacon pancakes in leftover bacon grease. Use a biscuit cutter or the exterior round of a mason jar lid to pour the pancake batter into the skillet and form ideal silver dollar rounds. The extra fat adds a bronzed crust to the exterior that cocoons the tender inside. Drain the pancakes on clean kitchen towels after frying.
Reader tip: If you don’t have unflavored gelatin on hand and need to make these bacon pancakes on a Sunday morning, one helpful MDA reader suggested substituting potato starch for the gelatin. We haven’t tested this to ensure it works the same way as the gelatin, but it can’t hurt to try in a pinch!
Bacon pancakes sound like a sinful breakfast treat, but these slightly sweet, mostly savory cakes require no repentance. Fluffy, moist, and salty with just a hint of sweetness, you can serve bacon pancakes with a drizzle of maple syrup or a dollop of sour cream and a hit of hot sauce.
Primal and paleo pancakes are a far cry from diner-style pancakes made from all-purpose flour and browned in butter on a hot griddle. But, our bacon pancakes provide a grain-free salty, smoky breakfast treat with a chewy, sturdy texture. These aren’t bacon slices cocooned by airy, fluffy pancakes that get drowned in syrup the minute they hit the serving plate, rendering the once-crisp centerpiece soggy and flabby when it touches the tongue.
Cook the bacon in a frying pan over medium heat. Leave the bacon fat in the pan. Crumble or finely chop the bacon and set aside.
Whisk egg whites into soft peaks (an electric mixer works well for this). Set aside.
In a large bowl mix together the coconut flour, gelatin, butter, chives, and bacon. Add the water and mix well then gently fold in the egg whites until combined. The batter will be thick and lumpy.
Re-heat the bacon fat in the frying pan over medium heat. Scoop small amounts (about 2 tablespoons) of batter into the pan, gently smoothing the batter out with a spoon to form small pancakes. Better yet, set a 3-inch biscuit cutter in the frying pan, drop the batter in the middle and then smooth out the batter to form perfectly round cakes.
Cook about 3 minutes on each side. Serve warm.
*Using the entire egg instead of just the whites can be done but it makes a heavier, less fluffy pancake.
Bacon pancakes, a dollop of rich sour cream, a garden-fresh sprinkle of chives—what more could you want for breakfast? Here are some ways to enhance the bacon pancakes:
A drizzle of maple syrup or raw honey
A dollop of full-fat Greek yogurt for a creamy note that’s tangy but not sour; keep the chives or snip some scallions on top
Lingonberries or cranberries stewed with a bit of coconut sugar, maple syrup, monk fruit, stevia, or Swerve until thick and spoonable
An over-easy fried egg with drippy yolk
A drizzle of melted dark chocolate and chopped almonds or peanuts
A tablespoon of all-natural peanut butter sandwiched between two bacon pancakes
Bacon pancakes sound like a sinful breakfast treat, but these slightly sweet, mostly savory cakes require no repentance. Fluffy, moist, and salty with just a hint of sweetness, bacon pancakes can be served with a light drizzle of 
